page_title: Shropshire Canal
section_title: Takeover and decline
hierarchical_section_title: Shropshire Canal / History / Takeover and decline
caption_attribution_description: English: The Shropshire Canal at Blists Hill Victorian Town passes in front of the derelict Madeley Wood Brick and Tile Works
context_page_description: The Shropshire Canal was a tub boat canal built to supply coal, ore and limestone to the industrial region of east Shropshire, England, that adjoined the River Severn at Coalbrookdale. It ran from a junction with the Donnington Wood Canal ascending the 316 yard long Wrockwardine Wood inclined plane to its summit level, it made a junction with the older Ketley Canal and at Southall Bank the Coalbrookdale branch went to Brierly Hill above Coalbrookdale; the main line descended via the 600 yard long Windmill Incline and the 350 yard long Hay Inclined Plane to Coalport on the River Severn. The short section of the Shropshire Canal from the base of the Hay Inclined Plane to its junction with the River Severn is sometimes referred to as the Coalport Canal.
  Construction of the canal was completed in 1792, and it operated successfully until the 1830s. The construction and operation of the Hay inclined plane was documented by two Prussian engineers who visited it in 1826 or 1827. In the 1840s it was leased by the Shropshire Union Canal, but was suffering from subsidence by the 1850s.
context_section_description: In 1845, the Ellesmere and Chester Canal Company took over the Birmingham and Liverpool Junction Canal, and appointed a committee to consider how best to convert them to railways, and what extensions might be necessary to provide a comprehensive transport network. The following year, the company became the Shropshire Union Railways and Canal Company, by an Act of Parliament which authorised the new company to take over the Shrewsbury Canal and to buy the Montgomery Canal and the Shropshire Canal. In 1847, the Shropshire Union Company agreed to the terms of a lease from the London and North Western Railway Company (LNWR), and so lost its independence after little more than a year, but continued to manage the canals under its control.
  The 500 shares of the Shropshire Canal were initially valued at £150 each, making it worth £75,000. It was making around £4,000 per year, and rather than buying it, the Shropshire Union decided to lease it instead, for an annual sum of £3,125. The agreement began on 1 November 1849. There were serious problems with subsidence, and the manager recommended that the canal should be converted into a railway in January 1855, but although the Shropshire Union board agreed, their recommendation to the LNWR was ignored. In July 1855, a breach of the canal occurred, when it broke through into the Oakengates railway tunnel. The summit level emptied, causing floods in the town. A second breach occurred in September, on a section which had been re-routed over a mine shaft to make way for the Shrewsbury and Birmingham Railway, and seven more occurred the following year. The LNWR then obtained an Act of Parliament in 1857, which allowed them to buy the canal for £62,500, and to close it from the Wrockwardine Wood inclined plane to the Windmill inclined plane, and use the bed for a railway. Closure took place on 1 June 1858. Parts of the bed were used for a railway to Coalport, which opened in 1861. The Stirchley tunnel was converted into a cutting as part of this project.
  By 1894, the Hay incline was no longer in use, but the section from Kemberton and Halesfield collieries was used to carry coal to Blists Hill furnaces until 1912. 29,066 tons of coal were carried in 1905. The furnaces were blown out in 1912, but this section of the canal was not officially abandoned until 1944, along with much of the rest of the Shropshire Union system.
caption: The canal at Blists Hill passes in front of the derelict Madeley Wood Brick and Tile Works
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